and a racist...
Cannabis prohibition
Cannabis was added to the Confidential Restricted List in 1923 under the Narcotics Drug Act Amendment Bill after a vague reference to a "new drug" during a late-night session of the House of Commons on April 23, 1923.[17][18] More specifically, the government introduced the Act to Prohibit the Improper Use of Opium and other Drugs; this was a consolidation of other legislation but now listed three new drugs, including marijuana.[19]
Historians often point to the 1922 publication of Emily Murphy's The Black Candle (which was reprinted in 1973) as the inspiration for the addition of the three extra drugs. Murphy was a suffragist and police magistrate who wrote a series of articles in Maclean's magazine under the pen-name "Janey Canuck", which formed the basis of her book.[20] She used numerous anecdotes culled mostly from anti-drug reformers and police to make her arguments, which make strong links between drugs and race and the threat this poses to white women. She claimed that a ring of immigrants from other countries, particularly China, would corrupt the white race. [21] "It is hardly credible that the average Chinese peddler has any definite idea in his mind of bringing about the downfall of the white race, his swaying motive being probably that of greed, but in the hands of his superiors, he may become a powerful instrument to that end."[22]
Although Murphy's anti-drug writings were widely read and helped spread the drug panic across the country, historian Catharine Carstairs disputes that the seven-page chapter Marahuana—a new menace in Murphy's book inspired the inclusion of cannabis on Canada's restricted substance list. Specifically, Murphy was not respected by the Division of Narcotic Control because of the creative liberties she took in presenting research they had assisted her with. According to Carstairs, "There were insinuations in the records that the bureaucrats at the division of narcotic control did not think very highly of Emily Murphy and did not pay attention to what she was writing about, and they didn't consider her a particularly accurate or valuable source."[23]
